0 Days for Life, a a community-based campaign that takes a determined, peaceful approach to showing local communities the consequences of abortion, will be concluding its nationwide UNITED bus tour Sunday.

By the time it is finished Sunday, it will have hit 125 stops in all 50 states in just 40 days. It is considered one of the biggest pro-life mobilizations in history.

They have received both national and regional media attention as they make their way across the USA, and now ahead of the election they offer a unique perspective on the most polarizing issue of our time.

“Being pro-life means wanting what is best for women and babies. The Texas law was in the best interest of women’s health. Because of the decision today, beauty parlors, veterinarian clinics and public pools will be held to higher sanitary and health standards than abortion clinics.” Jeanne Mancini, President of the March for Life. “If we are pro-woman, can’t we agree to care about safety and health standards? For years abortion advocates have equated greater access to abortion with improving women’s health. In doing so they have advocated for substandard health regulations. This is not pro-woman. Women and babies are the real losers of today’s decision.”

The March for Life in Washington, D.C., began as a small demonstration on January 22, 1974, the first anniversary of the now-infamous Supreme Court decisions in Roe v. Wade and Doe v. Bolton and rapidly grew to be the largest pro-life event in the world. The peaceful demonstration that has followed on this somber anniversary every year since is a witness to the truth concerning the greatest human rights violation of our time, abortion.

cturner@sbpublicaffairs.com

The Missionary Movement to 'Save' Black Babies

- by reporter Akiba Solomon -

I wanted to bring to your attention a new investigative article in Colorlines, The Missionary Movement to 'Save' Black Babies, by reporter Akiba Solomon.

"The article which details the extremes the pro-life movement is taking to create "fake" family planning centers targeting black women"

The article which details the extremes the pro-life movement is taking to create "fake" family planning centers targeting black women, and aggressively marketing to black women with misinformation about abortion.
Solomon's investigation unpacks the insidious practice with great detail, breaking new ground in the story of so-called "Crisis Pregnancy Centers."

The piece explores how:

* Care Net, the nation’s largest network of Evangelical Christian crisis pregnancy centers, has been attempting to place unregulated, non-profit facilities that resemble family planning clinics in Black neighborhoods. They call this technique “planting.” The “planting” process falls under a so-called Urban Initiative.

* They’ve been using the propaganda film “Maafa 21,” billboards that repeat decontextualized statistics from the film. Using what appears to be concrete facts from this film, Republican and ultraconservative Black ministers, activists and volunteers perpetuate the idea that Black women and babies are being targeted for genocide, mainly by Planned Parenthood.

* How Black Republican/tea party-affiliated Evangelicals are leveraging the propaganda. In Care Net advertising, Urban Initiative centers are supposedly Black-owned, operated and community-centered. What Akiba found, in Kansas City, MO, at least, is that they are absolutely not. Instead, a group of suburban white women who admitted that they had no experience with the deeply segregated Black side of town relied on a local adviser who is Black. His politics are in line with Todd Akin’s and don’t reflect that of the overall community.

Basically the piece is a window into how the pro-life movement is targeting and essentially guilting and scaring African American women.

(Chicago) The death of Tonya Reaves, a 24 year-old who died after an abortion at Planned Parenthood’s Loop Health Center in Chicago, has remained a mystery because employees at the Chicago Office of the Medical Examiner failed to comply with the Life Legal Defense Foundation’s request for Reaves’ autopsy report. The controversial manner of Reaves’ death on July 20th trigged a hailstorm of calls for abortion provider regulation in Illinois, one of the few states allowing abortion providers to function virtually unfettered with little or no oversight.

Attorney Allison K. Aranda, Senior Staff Counsel for the Life Legal Defense Foundation (LLDF), stated that a formal public records request for Reaves’ autopsy report was made in writing on July 23rd by a staff member of Operation Rescue, who received a denial of her request via telephone. The caller, from the medical examiner’s office, informed Operation Rescue that their request was denied because they did not have family authorization or a subpoena.

Illinois law specifically states that all records in the custody or possession of a public body are presumed to be open to inspection or copying, and nowhere does the state exempt autopsy reports from compliance. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) Guide for Law Enforcement published July 12, 2012 by the Attorney General’s Office specifically states that autopsy reports are public records and should be released. A 2010 Illinois Public Access Counselor review also stated clearly that autopsy reports in the files of the medical examiner are within the provenance of the FOIA and concluded that, “the reports are public records and should be released.”

“The medical examiner’s office has no basis to deny my client’s request for the autopsy report involving the deceased Tonya Reaves,” explained Aranda, who called for immediate compliance from the medical examiner. In the event that Operation Rescue’s lawful request for this public document is not met, Aranda promised legal action. She also noted that the medical examiner is already in violation of Illinois law, which provides that, “Each public body denying a request for public records shall notify the requester in writing of the decision to deny the request, the reasons for the denial, including a detailed factual basis for the application of any exemption claimed, and the names and titles or positions of each person responsible for the denial.” Operation Rescue received none of this required due process of law in their valid FOIA request for the autopsy report of Tonya Reaves.

About the Life Legal Defense Foundation
Life Legal Defense Foundation is a non-profit organization composed of attorneys and other concerned citizens, committed to giving helpless and innocent human beings of any age, and their advocates, a trained and committed voice in the courtrooms of our nation. For more information, go to www.lldf.org